Pete Hamill - Tabloid City

— Hey, Fonseca. I went for the papers. And some coffees.

Cheerful. She lays a paper bag on the table. Hefts about six newspapers.

— What time is it, anyway? he says, trying to smile.

She removes coat and hat, drops the newspapers on the foot of the bed. Glances at her watch, tells him it’s four-fifteen.

— Jesus, Fonseca says. I gotta go.

— Oh, no ya don’t, she says, in a cheeky growl.

She starts pulling her sweater over her head. Black bra showing. She picks up the World.

— Ya got the wood twice, Fonseca. The wraparound. The main paper. Gotta be a record! I bought the last five copies. And guess what? They gave me a credit line!

He sits up, blanket pulled to his shoulders.

— But—

She is slipping off her jeans, uses thumbs to remove her black panties. Then bounces onto the bed.

— We gotta celebrate, man.

She carries a copy of the World into bed, folded back to the second page of the wraparound, and slides it under her.

— Don’t worry about making a mess. I’m gonna carry this paper to my grave.

She moves a hand under the covers.

— Oh, Fonseca, you’re ready.

— I am, he says, and pulls her to him.

4:15 p.m. Ali Watson. JTTF office, Manhattan.

He is in his office with Malachy Devlin, Eddie Taylor, Frank Harris, and Mary Prescott. The squad. He feels that he has been given a part in some Off-Broadway play, or an episode of Law & Order. There is no script but everybody knows the lines. The meeting is a performance, even for Ali. The big shots told him he could excuse himself from all this, take a few weeks off. He insisted on being here. They are discussing, after all, his son.

Malachy has led the briefing. The city police have found the Lexus and are combing it for traces of Malik. That will take a while. There are hairs. Prints. They are examining several different video cameras on the block, one in the parking lot itself, another above the doors of a small repair shop across the street. NYPD is looking at the images, trying to find Malik in them and see how he was dressed. There are advisories ready for release, drawings showing his face with and without a beard. A press release should be ready by five o’clock, after it’s cleared in Washington. Then it will go out to the media.

— Once that happens, Malachy says, the shit will hit the fan.

— Yeah, Ali says. Thinking: What the fuck else can I say?

— The press will go nuts, Mary Prescott says, in her cool thirty-ish way. That would make three homicides and the possibility of a terrorist act.

— Yeah, Ali says. And we’re looking for a cop’s son.

They sit there for a silent moment.

— I’ll have to disappear, Ali says.

The others look at him. His jacket hangs behind him on the back of his chair. His tie is unknotted. His cuffs are unbuttoned and folded above his wrists.

— Suppose it’s not him? Mary says.

— It’s him, Ali says.

He stands. Inhales. Breathes out.

— We have to figure out the target, he says.

Ali turns his back.

— The target will mean something… personal… to him. That’s what Patchin Place was. Something personal.

He faces them again. Groping for a few more lines in a script that doesn’t exist.

— Leave me alone for a while. Maybe I can remember something.

They all stand. Malachy clears his throat.

— If anyone calls for you…

— Lie. Tell them I’m mourning.

4:35 p.m. Sam Briscoe. City room.

He hears them when he is still in the hall, passing by the cartoons and the typewriters, hears the low rumble of many voices, meshed into one growling atonal baritone chorus, punctuated by stabs of high laughter and an occasional surprised yelp. Then he smells them: the odor of burnt tobacco, like a fog from the past. He turns into the corridor leading to the city room, and there they are: faces creating a blur, like a mural splashed and daubed in a fierce rush, from a palette of pink, ivory, black, brown. From some distant part of the city room, Sinatra is singing “Come Fly With Me.” “If you can use some exotic booze, / There’s a bar in far Bombay.”

Someone spots him.

— Sam!

And others yell his name, and they are coming forward to embrace him, blocking his passage. Then he hears applause. Sees some of them clapping soundlessly, with glasses in one hand, bumping their wrists, and more coming forward. He removes his coat, holds it. He sees steam on the windows overlooking West Street. A dark late afternoon.

Hey, Sam… Hey, where’s the Fucking Publisher?… Drink, Sam? What the hell!

His sense of dread vanishes. They are all here. From the Queens and Brooklyn bureaus; from the police shack; Warren up from Washington; the old photographers and the young; Heidi and Albert from the library; four old printers from the days when the World had a composing room; the techies who tend the computers; the whole damned crew from advertising. Across the room he sees the tall balding man who designed the World . There’s Scott Gellis, the sports editor, and what looks like his whole goddamned team, sitting on desks in the sports department, bottles on the desks. Gellis is smoking a plump cigar. Now Sinatra is singing “You Make Me Feel So Young.”

Here comes Matt Logan, pushing through the crowd, flapping a hand at the pale blue nicotine fog. Briscoe remembers: Logan never smoked. One of the few. They embrace.

— It’s all yours now, Matt, Briscoe says, and chuckles.

— Yeah. Goddamn it.

— It could be fun.

— That remains to be seen. Is the F.P. coming?

Briscoe laughs.

— Never. He doesn’t want to land on his back on West Street.

Logan smiles.

— Thank God. One hug from him and I’d never be forgiven.

Then he motions with his head.

— This lot here, Sam? Logan says. We could put out a hell of a paper.

— We already did, Briscoe says.

One of the older photographers, Barney Weiss, is moving around with his Nikon. Some of the younger reporters are using cell phones as cameras. Others reach over to tap Briscoe on the shoulder or exchange fist bumps.

— Whatever you do, Matt, don’t pick your nose. You’ll end up on YouTube.

Logan laughs, and angles away, and Briscoe sees Janet, making a secretarial face that demands his attention. He nods to her. Slowly he pushes through, smiling, explaining that he has to get rid of his coat, hears an outburst of laughter, sees a Mexican pizza delivery man looking baffled, holding at least five stacked pies. No sign of the Fonseca kid. I hope he’s getting laid. He sure earned it. Here comes Dorfman, the city hall guy, smoking a pipe left to him by Murray Kempton. He says something that is lost in the general chaos of words. Sam, hey, Sam, let’s… No deadline tonight, baby… Who’s got a bottle opener?… I’m not shittin’ ya. The Iverson deal is… Where’s Helen? Anybody seen Helen?

Briscoe knows Helen isn’t coming. Or said she wasn’t. She’d love the aroma of this version of a city room. Christ, fourteen years since I stopped cigarettes, he thinks, and I want one now. A whiskey too. Cynthia helped me stop both. There’s a clear spot now and he eases toward his office, where Janet is at the door. He shrugs off his jacket while he moves. Now another voice is playing on the CD player, wherever it is. “Well, since my baby left me, / I found a new place to dwell…”

And here coming into the city room is Billygoat, followed by a brigade of pressmen. They are all carrying bundles of newspapers. Briscoe stops, turns back into the city room. They plop the papers on desks, cut the cords, and start handing them out. Everybody is laughing. Briscoe sees the wood, and laughs out loud too, reaching for a copy.